Thanks for sharing your thoughts! I admit I was more into the technical details and had little thoughts towards WLB and other things. I'm probably bored about my life so these "grand things" do pull towards me. On the other side I have a family so I tend to put that over everything else (Maybe that's the source of boredom?) so these books provide the drug of "grand scheme + technology" which is really my thing :)

I'm glad that you maintained an OK relationship with Tom. It could be tough relationship.